


Like a Leaf in the Wind

by leijonara



Category: Homestuck
Genre: F/M, Horrorterrors - Freeform, Muteness, deafness, precanon, self mutilation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-07
Updated: 2015-06-07
Packaged: 2018-04-03 05:53:55
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4089433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leijonara/pseuds/leijonara
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Meulin knew well the dangers of being the highblood's matesprit, just as she knew the dangers of him not sleeping in his coon. But she'd never expected this.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Like a Leaf in the Wind

**Author's Note:**

> This is rather old, not going to lie. But I do love writing about events that are mentioned but not explored in canon.

She slumbered peacefully, curled up on her matesprite's lap. They'd fallen asleep watching Hate Friends again- it was the one where Troll Monica and Troll Chandler were pretending they weren't flushed. The very best one, Meulin had mused before she fell asleep.  
She was startled awake by a little jerk.  
The green blood opened her eyes and looked up at Kurloz with bleary vision. He looked so different without his paint, and wearing nothing but boxers. He was trembling and making little noises. Ah. He was prone to nightmares and horrorterrors, even moreso than most trolls, and sleeping out of the slime didn't exactly help. 

Meulin was about to shake him awake, lead him to coon, when his eyes snapped wide open. She flinched back in surprise, staring at him as he stared straight ahead, chest heaving for a few moments. She hesitantly lifted a hand to rest on his cheek- and he started to scream. Her hand jerked away of its own accord, like she'd been bitten.  
It was a loud, rending, tearing noise- she felt she'd never heard anything so obscenely raw. It went on an on and on and after only a few moments she felt an ache build up in her ears, an immense pressure.  
They started stinging and she slapped her hands over them, crying out Kurloz's name pitifully to try and get him to stop. The awful scream seemed to go right through her hands, splitting her skull and causing a buzzing pain behind her eyes until she felt faint.  
Her ears rang and throbbed and there was a warm stickiness around them now. Meulin hesitantly opened her eyes, sniffling at the pain, and was about to attempt to get him to stop again when she realised he had.

Kurloz was staring at her, mouth hanging open, but only slightly. He had tears in his eyes, diluted purple trails running down his cheeks as his chest quaked. But she heard no crying, just the same loud ringing- although that was fading slowly, leaving behind pain.  
His lips started to move and he reached forward to grasp her shoulders, lifting one hand to cup her cheek. She suspected he was repeating her name, but had nothing to go by but sight.  
She pulled a hand away from her ear to inspect it gingerly and gulped, tears springing to her eyes as she took in the greenish-brown smudges covering her palms and fingers. Kurloz stared too. He carefully leaned forward, reaching to move a lock of black hair from in front of her ear, and then gaped. The highblooded troll brought his hand back to his own mouth. He appeared to be trying hard not to vomit.

She tipped her head, wincing at how that hurt, and asked in a trembling voice why she couldn't hear him, and what was wrong with her ear. She couldn't hear her own words truly, the vibrations she felt sounded distorted and she hoped he'd understood.  
He shrugged loosely, wide eyes still fixed on her with more pity and terror and distress than she'd ever seen.  
He reached forward to pull her into his chest. Meulin gave a faint whimper before leaning into the tight embrace, trembling with faint sobs. Her hearing would come back, right? It was just a little trauma. But the look that had stuck Kurloz when he saw her ear seemed to say otherwise.  
They stayed like that for a little while, crying to each other in the open way that only the most wrecked hearts can. Eventually the sun set and Meulin pulled away, forced herself to try and make them something for breakfast, although her hands shook so much that eventually her matesprite simply took over without a word- not that it would've made a difference.

He'd not tried to say anything yet, but had kept the viewing box on as a way of monitoring her hearing. Nothing yet.  
After breakfast, Kurloz went into his bathroom and brought out a first aid kit. She suspected he didn't know the depth of the injury, but was perhaps still on edge seeing so much blood encrusted in her hair.  
He cleaned her up with a warm bath, gently washing around her ears and combing out all the flakes of dried blood until she was clean, then carefully swabbing out all that was left inside the ear. That bit hurt a lot.  
Then he applied a soothing salve to her horns, which were aching just as her ears were. That helped a lot.

Meulin tried to smile at him the whole time, aware that he was blaming himself every second. She knew it wasn't his fault he had the nightmares he did.  
The next day, when the awful headaches and pain had faded, they went to visit their friends. She wouldn't have gone except she knew he badly needed to speak with his moirail but wouldn't leave her unless she was being cared for.  
He explained the situation to Kankri, who was unfortunately the only troll available.  
When Kurloz left, she spent an awkward mid-evening tea sitting at the mutant's dining table, trying to sip at his nasty flowery tea. He seemed unsure of what to do, wanting to express his condolences in the way he thought most proper yet not wanting to trigger her by speaking.  
Eventually she just leaned over and hugged him and wrote down on a pad, 'DONT FEEL BAD FUR ME!!!' with a smiley kitty face. She'd become a little self conscious of her voice, unable to control what she could barely make out herself, and had decided to carry a notepad with her until her hearing came back.  
He smiled uncertainly and wrote probably the shortest thing he'd EVER written- 'I'll try.'  
It was a bit rude, she supposed, but understandable. At least he was being honest.

 

Kurloz returned to take her home with barely a word to Kankri, and seemed brooding on the walk to his hive. Meulin frowned as they reached it- she loved the ocean, although she didn't like swimming, and to not hear a thing walking right by it was just wrong.  
She went to take a nap in her coon, and Kurloz went to the ablution trap to clean off before joining her. He spent a long time in there, and didn't meet her gaze when he came out. They curled up together in the slime and she tried to forget the hollowness in his eyes.

One day, about two weeks after the incident, she awoke to an empty recouperacoon. Stumbling out of coon and into the ablution block, Meulin gasped loudly when she saw Kurloz, hunched over the sink and shoulders quaking with sobs. She wondered what had caused him so much distress, and moved closer so that his face wasn't hidden behind his shoulder- and immediately wished she hadn't.

 

Kurloz Makara had sewn his mouth shut.


End file.
